Gupta comeback rumours reach SA With Samantha Graham-Maré

There are rumours that the Guptas could be the “secret” funder of the R16-billion Smart Meter programme of Electricity Minister Dr Kgosientso Ramokgopa. This has been revealed to BizNews by the Democratic Alliance’s (DA’s) Shadow Minister of Electricity, Samantha Graham-Maré, who has been struggling since July to identify the mystery funder. “I have had people contact me from as far as Dubai after our last discussion to say that they are of the opinion that it might be the Guptas who are the mystery funders…they were just saying that they had encountered the Guptas in Dubai, seen them sort of having coffee with various role players, and that smart meters were a big element of demand-side management in Dubai, and as such felt that perhaps they were keen on transferring the technology to South Africa.” Meanwhile, the DA has petitioned the ESKOM System Operator to investigate what appears to be a growing trend to issue misleading load-shedding advisories.